the Clintons .. Politics Without Conscience

[no_to_war_economy]

IT'S ONE of the things that people forget about Clinton. They think that some transformation took place after the Republicans seized control of Congress in 1994.

That totally rewrites Clinton's political history. He was a founding member of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC). He was right there with Joe Lieberman, and philosophically, they've never been more than a micron apart. That's true from his early days as governor, to that interminable address at the Democratic convention in 1988.

For example, the left seems to think that the destruction of welfare was something that was stuffed down Clinton's throat. But this was his idea. It was part of the whole DLC agenda, with a very high place on it--along with being tough on defense, tough on the poor, tough on Blacks.

So, of course, it comes as no surprise that within six months of being in office, Bill Clinton turns over his economic policies to the bond market--and starts recruiting Robert Rubin and all these other people from Wall Street.

There's a scene in Bob Woodward's book The Agenda where Bill at one point turns to Rubin and says, "You mean to tell me that the success of the program and my re-election hinges on the Federal Reserve and a bunch of fucking bond traders?" Rubin says yes, and Clinton basically says okay, if that's the way it's got to be. He doesn't even stop to wash his hands of it, say a little prayer, light a candle.

The Clintons are political invertebrates. They really don't have any kind of spine. They're infinitely flexible, because really, it's all about power for them. They're not really rooted in any kind of ideology. In that sense, I don't think the DLC program was necessarily what Clinton really believed in. It's just that he knew this was the path to power.

the truth hurts people

http://www.counterpunch.org/stclair02212007.html

[acmavm]

1. People think old Bill can walk on water. I don't know about that,

but he would leave a ring around the lake.

edit: to explain I mean he ain't the pure, squeaky clean, democratic martyr some people would love to have everyone believe he is. He's a political opportunist, just like his wife.

[Benhurst]

12. Bill can walk on water.

But only when it is frozen.

[Kare]

32. The reason bill looks so good

is directly related to who came before and who came after.

Compared to W I think poppy was a good president.

Of course compared to W my dog might be a viable candidate too..... at least he's friendly

[cali]

2. I'm not a Clinton fan

but Counterpunch is utterly and completely vile.

[no_to_war_economy]

3. this has always interested me, what is it about Counter Punch that every hates

they tell the truth about Democrats and Rethuglicans

[cali]

4. Baloney. The truth, my ass.

They're firmly in the no difference between repukes and dems, and they're constant attacks on Kerry were ugly, slanted, and in no way a franchise on truth.

[ProfessorGAC]

7. I Would Suggest That This Piece. . .

. . .is highly opinionated and that doesn't make it the truth. It makes it someone's opinion. The facts may be accurate. But the interpretation isn't the truth. It's just interpretation.

In fact, i don't accept the Clinton/Rubin exchange in your snip to even be indicative of the point made. Nor do i concur with the conclusion in that paragraph. I think the issue about the fed board is apropos of nothing. And, i think Rubin was wrong. The fed had very little to do with the economy in 1996. They helped in '92 and '93 and did damage in '99 and 2000. In between they were eunuchs. So, the piece may have facts, but the interpretation is not only just an opinion, but an invalid one.
The Professor

[Captain Hilts]

9. Gee, too bad we didn't have four more years of GHWB.

Clinton was the only one with the guts to run against him.

[ProfessorGAC]

16. Huh?

Did you mean to reply to me? I don't get your reply. Mine was about the article being opinion not absolute truth.
GAC

[blm]

34. Clinton could win because of the guts of those Democrats who pummeled Bush1

through constant investigations his ENTIRE term without let up.

The steady stream of bad headlines on IranContra, BCCI, and Iraqgate helped break the trust of the American people.

You think Clinton could have won in 1992 if Bush1 had the level of media protection that Bush2 enjoyed throughout his first term?

[ProfessorGAC]

37. Good Catch

41 was not a good president but he's not the disaster Silverspoon is.
The Professor

[Captain Hilts]

42. Clinton wins EVERY presidential survey vs. either Bush, etc. Some fatigue! nt

[blm]

46. You referred to 1992 and I put it in its proper context.

Wouldn't you prefer to run against a GOP president who had been under investigation for four solid years exposing his dirty deeds in constant headlines?

Surely that was better than running against a GOP president who had congress and most media protecting him, and with the LAST Dem president supporting his major military decisions throughout his entire first term.

[Morgana LaFey]

53. Nonsense. Clinton was just one of many who had the guts to do so

The first time I saw Clinton was in a room FULL of other Dems who were speaking, most of them candidates or would-be candidates for the Presidency -- well before the first primary. Clinton hadn't declared yet, but it was rumored that he might.

He was taller than any of them, IIRC, and handsome, and witty. Charisma to BURN -- after it lit up the whole room.

[fooj]

60. Charisma does not equal CHARACTER.

Think of the possibilities if Bill held George HW Bush accountable for Iran/Contra...

He gave him a pass and the American people are paying DEARLY for it. Take a look around. Half of these players would be in jail and not out actively DESTROYING what's left of our military and our international standing. Now he's the "adopted" son of the BFEE. BURN, is right.

[Morgana LaFey]

65. Oh, I agree wholeheartedly

I was merely taking exception to the assertion that Clinton was the "only one with the guts to run against GHWB." Factually incorrect.

[MH1]

22. Um, no they don't - they lie as bad as anyone

In 2004 they posted an article urging people to vote against Kerry. It blatantly lied about his environmental record (he has always had one of the best environmental records of any Senator).

They're third party shills, "not a dime's worth of difference" types.

Not a dime's worth of difference? Hmmm. Tell that to -

* the families of people who died on 9/11, or due to the aftermath
* the families of our dead and maimed soldiers from the Iraq debacle
* the families of the dead and maimed from the Katrina non-response fiasco

need I go on?

What you posted may even be reasonably accurate, but coming from counterpuke, it's only because it's a chance to attack a Democrat.

[KoKo]

47. It has some views

about Israel that folks find offensive.

[theoldman]

5. Bill Clinton is a master politician who beat the Republicans at

their own game. That's why they hate him so much. A truly honest person can never win an election. That is a fact of life. If you don't understand this, you do not understand politics.

[GeorgeGist]

21. So you say...

oldman. I take it you admire politics as usual and will support Bill's protege.

[theoldman]

26. I will support the Democrat candidate for president.

In no way could any of them be worse than Bush. I do not admire politics but I find it very interesting. That is why I post on this web site.

[napi21]

35. "A truly honest person can never win an election"!

I believe THAT is the truest statement I've seen in print for a LONG TIME!

ONE "honest as you'll ever find" politician actually WON the Presidency ONCE! Jimmy Carter. BOTH sides came to hate him rather quickly, and many of them still do!

That was a long time ago, and it's WORSE today than it ever was. There are NO really HONEST ppoliticians in the WORLD!

[Captain Hilts]

51. FDR denounced the World Court to get nominated and wouldn't denounce lynching to keep his job.

You can't be pure and hold the job.

[bigtree]

6. this is like what the Soviets do to their old leaders

[Captain Hilts]

8. Okay, you are politically more pure than the Clintons and I am. Feel better now? nt

[papau]

10. The DLC are conservative on economics Democrats -social liberals - so how

is that Politics Without Conscience?

Fellow needs a nap.

[no_to_war_economy]

11. how does the BIG dog ignore the effects of the sanctions on Iraqi children

Conscience is a faculty or sense that leads to feelings of remorse when we do things that go against our moral values, or which informs our moral judgment before performing such an action. Such feelings are not intellectually reached, though they may cause us to 'examine our conscience' and review those moral precepts, or perhaps resolve to avoid repeating the behaviour.

[Captain Hilts]

43. That was Hussein's fault. He had a choice, and he chose to starve his own people...

rather than play along and get aid.

[Leopolds Ghost]

24. Who cares if they are social liberals? Lots of people are social liberals.

I've met confederate flag-waving, bumper-stick wearing rednecks who are social liberals.

Some of them are even economic liberals (and social conservatives). Those are the ones Clinton excoriated Dean for trying to attract (despite the Congressional Black Caucus support for Dean doing so).

There are lots and lots of pocket-book right-wingers who are social liberals.

There are lots of neo-liberal ex-hippies who are social liberals. They always vote for the big business Dems. They are rabid partisans -- got to have something to hang onto, I guess.

These folks are not civil libertarians, and they do not care about social justice.

[Beelzebud]

30. NAFTA, Media de-regulation, and the DMCA are all without conscience...

[papau]

55. The tele bill was must pass - and the GOP controlled and insisted on media de-reg. - DMCA

actually worked - the 5 year horror that was predicted was adverted via gov's find the money to help via other programs. And NAFTA by the numbers was a wash - not a disaster - at least jobs wise.

[Beelzebud]

64. The DMCA worked? Tell that to the grandma sued for downloading "Happy Birthday".

[Greyhound]

31. I don't see how you can claim that they are social liberals.

He (and she) talk like social liberals, but they act like the worst sort of social regressives.

Are we to believe that the fact that he accomplished none of the socially liberal policies he purported to advocate, yet initiated, advocated, and accomplished such policies as the mis-named Welfare "Reform", broad expansion of a number of corporate welfare programs including tax incentives to move companies and jobs off-shore, wage suppression, further weakening of union influence, GATT, and NAFTA? If so, he was monumentally incompetent, which I don't believe at all. No, I think he did exactly what he set out to do, to back off the thumb screws enough that it hurt a little less, and thereby preserve the corporate agenda.

[papau]

54. They were the first to try to break down barriers in the military against gays - they gave

minorities a major share of the jobs - at all levels - for the first time

They protected women's rights

They developed programs and expanded programs that gave the poor and minorities and the middle class a chance.

Wage suppression is bull - the stats show that for the first time in 25 years the poor and middle class actually made progress - moving back up after the drop in after inflation income under under Reagan/Bush. Now 6 years of Bush and another expanding economy and the average hourly wage is just last year passing what it was in 2001 when he took office. Off shoring and in shoring were balanced back them - not like now.

GATT and NAFTA were standard trade treaties that favored the US - and they were flawed - and yes there was little in the way of job gains because of them - but there was also little in the way of job loss despite all the sound and fury on DU. Car/oil folks with unions helping corporations because they thought that was the way to save jobs was the way we destroyed middle class jobs - not Nafta. Today Hillary says she would insist treaties include directly the environmental/jobs/rights provisions put into Nafta via side agreements that proved unworkable/unenforceable.

[Greyhound]

59. I'm not sure where you were living in the 90's, but it sure wasn't here.

He (not they) threw health care, women, and minorities under the bus in order to get enough Democratic support to pass GATT, NAFTA, and the rest of his corporate economic agenda. He pursued allowing gays in the military in such an incompetent and half-hearted way that it was sure to fail. He talked about progressive issues but passed pro-corporate, anti-worker policies.

He bailed on his promises to help the displaced workers from the Midwest that industrial "downsizing" screwed, and the only reason there was a general rise in middle-class wages was the technology boom which he had no part in creating and which he eviscerated in his second term.

Well, I guess Kool-Aid does come in different flavors.

[papau]

61. nope - universal Health care with ins co profit was demand of Congress - HE did not

throw it under the bus - indeed following the defeat in 93 there were many smaller health bills that improved health care.

Throwing women under the bus is a FreeRepublic assertion - a statement based on no facts. The economic growth was based on solid deficit control and the confidence that built which motivated business investment. The personal computer revolution had already occurred and the internet - as ARPANET - was around in the 70's. But there indeed was a large boost to productivity from better use of these tools which required business investment to find. The portion of the economy that was internet/IT/computer jobs was actually small. While the improved productivity was indeed there and part of that improvement came from better use of the computer, betting Board Room approval of the investment that allowed business to gear up and install better uses of the computer needed a government deficit under control. Reagan and Bush bought economic expansion using trillions of dollars borrowed from our grandchildren - which in turn caused and will cause a long period of poor growth as we absorb the yearly cost of the increased debt load. Clinton had a better way - a way that Obama has expressed interest in following.

Who in the House or Senate sold his vote for NAFTA or GATT for the price of killing health care? I am certain that no Democratic votes were required to pass either in the GOP controlled House. In the Senate I am hard pressed to name enough GOP that might have voted against to make the bills require Democratic votes to pass.

The incompetent talk on gays cost him his control of Congress - so that was obviously the plan -right?

The displaced workers from the Midwest - and elsewhere - got the AFofL/CIO retraining bill money - so again this seems to be without facts. Can you name the bill that went down to defeat because of lack of Clinton support that was a promise to Labor?

I wouldn't know about GOP Kool-Aid flavors - but it appears the GOP have come up with one that sells well on DU.

[Greyhound]

69. What a pant-load...

These "points" have debunked so many times it has become cliche and if you aren't aware of it, it is only because you don't want to, or have an interest in propagating the lies, either way, I don't care. The Clintons are, and always have been, corporatists, along with 90% of the re:puke: party and 60% of ours.

I did say internet when world wide web would be accurate, but so few outside the business are aware of the distinction, that the terms have become interchangeable.

Drink up, and congratulate yourself when it's over.

[SaveElmer]

13. Different day...

Same anti-Clinton horseshit...

The real problem some have is that President Clinton was highly successful...yet was not some raving left-wing loony...

He proved it was possible to successfully govern from the center...

And that just sticks in the craw of the left wing!

[papau]

56. the definition of left wing after reading this nonsense is hard to write down in terms of

government policy.

It is all assertion - no facts

A bit like being in a right wing discussion.

[MannyGoldstein]

14. Hey! Please Treat The Father of Outsourced Torture...

...with a little more respect. He felt their pa-a-a-a-ine.

(Think Bush started it? Think again.)

[Strawman]

15. Clinton was a governor not a leader

And many presidential scholars would argue that flexibility is the only way that modern presidents can be successful. Clinton was moderately successful at governing and not much of a moral leader.

What's better being a minimally successful flexible pre-emptive incrementalist or a failed yet principled, attempted reconstructor? It's a difficult question. Absent a sea change in domestic politics, those are our options when it comes to presidents.

Political time makes presidents as much as their inherent "character." After a collosal failure like Bush, I think whomever is president will have more flexibility to govern liberally than Bill Clinton did in 1992. If Bill Clinton had been strident and inflexible, he would have gotten even less of what he wanted.

[HamdenRice]

17. Not fair. Here's what the Rubin/Clinton "bond traders" comment really meant

First, to deflect some of the coming flames, I will agree with the overall thrust of the OP, which is that the Clintons are political invertebrates.

But I think some of you may be misinterpreting this exchange between Clinton and Rubin, and what the class politics of the resulting policies were.

It was not that Rubin and Clinton wanted to hand over finance policy to bond traders; it was the recognition that because of structural changes in the international financial markets that the Treasury Department and Fed no longer had control over interest rates.

Clinton wanted to decrease unemployment and repair the damage caused by twelve years of Reaganomics, which had vastly increased the federal debt (sound familiar? why are bushes do devastating on the federal debt?). Clinton like most Democrats, including DLC Democrats at that time, was a traditional Keynesian and believed that he could boost the economy by increasing federal spending. He wanted to target that spending on infrastructure and education; that's what he ran on.

Rubin was telling him that if the budget deficits increased, interest rates would remain high, offsetting any good that increased spending would accomplish on unemployment. This was a paradigm shift in the late 80s/early 90s that was trying to come to terms with the incalculable damage that Reagan/Bush had done. As Peter Peterson of the Blackstone Financial Group, fairly representative of the liberal wing of NY finance, wrote around that time describing Reagan/Bush fiscal policies, America had borrowed a trillion dollars and thrown a party.

Rubin was saying, and Clinton was understanding, that unless they reduced the federal deficit and debt, no progressive fiscal policies would work. Long term interest rates were persistently high because the "bond traders" did not believe that the deficit would every get under control, and they were constantly betting against lower interest rates in the long term. That's why Clinton immediately raised taxes on the rich, and gave important tax credits to the working poor. This began the decrease of the federal deficit and eventually the federal debt.

It worked. I was working in NY finance in the 90s, and after a few years, not just deficits, but the national debt begain to decline. There was so much money sloshing around because the federal government wasn't sucking it up, that the internet boom could be financed, as well as a lot of rebuilding in auto, steel, and other nuts and bolts industries. For example, despite years as the "rust belt," American steel industries began dominating international markets with specialized fabrication services. I realize it's hard to believe given the nightmare globalization has come to mean for American industry, but at that time globalization led to US domination of many industrial sectors. There were nightly news reports about European industries and governments trying to figure out how not to be completely swamped with American exports.

Unemployment in the northeast was so low that employers began bussing workers from the inner city to the suburbs. We achieved almost zero unemployment because of that strategy, and by the height of the boom, employers began looking in mental hospitals for workers.

I fear that Bush II's damage is much more severe than Bush I's, and that even Rubin's policies could not fix the damage. Moreover, as Paul Krugman has written, now that the Republican party has exposed itself as the party of economic-suicide- by-deficit, it makes no sense to reduce the debt because if the repugs ever get power again, they will target surpluses again for another looting spree.

[no_to_war_economy]

18. that is all I want to point ... we look back lovingly at the 90's

everyone was making money ... deficit was down ... internet boom ... money! money! money!

all at the same time that we were murdering half a million Iraqi children

America has no conscience

[HamdenRice]

20. I think the Counterpunch article was making a different point

In context, it suggests that Clinton was handing over economic policy to evil "bond traders," when in fact, the comment reflected the growing realization that bond traders already were in control of interest rates, and the question became how to work around that.

I agree that their Iraq policy, and several other policies, like their policy toward Haitian refugees, were disgraceful.

[raccoon]

23. And don't forget the so-called "welfare reform." nt

[HamdenRice]

25. That's also an unfair characterization

While I disagree with Clinton's welfare reform, I don't think the cited article fairly or accurately describes either the policy or politics of welfare reform in the Clinton era.

Clinton's original proposal was a "welfare to work" program, which like his tax credit proposals was designed to help the poor and working poor. It was a comprehensive program that would have included child care, health care, and education to help people transition to work at a liveable wage.

In fact, stripped of its pseudo right wing rhetoric, it was a thinly disguised guaranteed employment jobs program -- something that had been on the top of the left's agenda for decades.

When he submitted the program to the Republican Congress, they stripped out all the support for people making the transition. But as the program took off, unemployment was so low that some of those transition aspects of the program (the guaranteed employment) wasn't needed.

Many on the left made an accurate prediction about the resulting welfare reform -- namely that it worked fine during that period of very low unemployment but would be a catastrophe if unemployment every rose again.

That's exactly what happened after Clinton left office and Bush junior began his jihad against the American economy.

[papau]

57. Counterpunch stop telling truth decades ago - I doubt these poster know Cockburn's

background.

[BlueJac]

19. Bill Clinton

Thank you for the idiotic job costing NAFTA..........

NO MORE CLINTON'S OR DLC

[Kare]

33. I second that

no more DLC, never again

[Greyhound]

27. I am no fan of the Clintons, the reason is simple,

I look at what they've done, and do, and ignore what they say.
:kick:

[foo_bar]

63. the "Ben Franklin" quote in your sig is misattributed

* Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.

o Widely attributed to Franklin on the internet, sometimes without the second sentence, it is not found in any of his known writings, and the word "lunch" is not known to have appeared anywhere in english literature until the 1820s, decades after his death. The phrasing itself has a very modern tone and the second sentence especially might not even be as old as the internet. Some of these observations are made in response to a query at Google Answers.

A far rarer but somewhat more credible variation also occurs: "Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for dinner." Web searches on these lines uncovers the earliest definite citations for such a statement credit libertarian author James Bovard with a similar one in the Sacramento Bee (1994):

"Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner."

This statement also definitely occurs in the "Conclusion" (p. 333) of his book Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty (1994) ISBN 0312123337

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin

B. Franklin never said anything remotely like the second sentence, which would have opposed everything else he said, and is entirely a choose-your-own-polemic on the internets:

Democracy is when two wolves and a sheep vote on who's for dinner.
Liberty is when the sheep has his own gun.

http://www.wirelessforums.org/alt-cellular-verizon/latest-verizon-commercial-16043.html

But then, I love Neal Boortz, and he always says that a "true democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner". Majority rules.

http://ibloga.blogspot.com/2007/01/united-states-of-america-is-not.html

windbender - I never heard that before "the Democratic Party must be more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner."

http://www.beliefnet.com/boards_mini/index.asp?boardID=77104

For the Arts. Those who confuse our system of government with DEMOCRACY should find a real insight into democracy vs the American Constitutional limited Republic........................democracy being three wolves and a sheep voting for what shall be for dinner!

http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a743df962f6.htm

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. Liberty is two wolves attempting to have a sheep for dinner and finding a well-informed, well-armed sheep.

http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/16671636.htm

Hat said to me "democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting over what's for lunch: freedom is the sheep with a gun" What if the wolves also have guns? I asked him Oh well I suppose then you're back to democracy then.

http://www.kila.ie/stories/eastCoastTour03.asp

So, I think it unlikely that Franklin said the quotation. For a man who ensured that every other one of his 'clever' saying was put onto paper many times, it is difficult to see how a quotation as commonly repeated as this could have no original written source. And, if we take 1759 as the accepted date of the quotation, it is ever harder to imagine it coming from Franklin in London, the contented, rotund diplomat. Democracy was serving Pennsylvania just fine, and Franklin would soon become one of its great champions. The quotation's pessimism seems out of kilter with the rest of his career. And liberty, as colonial America knew it, was under no great threat - particularly not from any 'wolves' who might achieve power by election.

So, I favour the view that the quotation is apocryphal - made up by some anonymous wag, maybe in its complete 'two-part' form, maybe not - and subsequently attributed to Franklin just because someone thought it sounded a bit like him.

http://www.ovaloffice2008.com/2005_09_01_ovaloffice2008_archive.html

I think I've discovered the internet wag, thanks to Google cache:

Tony Satterwhite tells us: "I came up with my signature below, a twist on the old wolf-and-sheep political definitions. I've received more positive comments on this sig in the past two months than all my others combined, from non-libertarians as well as rational people!"

Here's Tony's signature -- truly a great one:
* Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for
dinner. Liberty is two wolves attempting to have a sheep for
dinner and finding a well-informed, well-armed sheep.

http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:kpngY0jr7_0J:www.theadvocates.org/liberator/vol-02-num-06.htm+%22two+wolves+and+a+sheep%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=182&gl=us&client=firefox-a

[theoldman]

28. After reading the responses to this post I can understand why

Democrats lose elections. It appears that the Democrats motto is "Divided we stand, united we fall".

[The Backlash Cometh]

29. Let's be fair.

For the first two years of Bill's term, he was a progressive Liberal who pushed Gay Rights and Health Care. It failed. It failed miserably. The right-wing conservatives used those two unpopular liberal ideas and rode in on top of the shit wave that Mellon Scaife had stirred up in Arkansas. Monica Lewinsky, was just the cherry on top.

If Bill hadn't triangulated, HE WOULD NEVER HAD MADE HIS SECOND TERM.

[Sapphire Blue]

36. kicked & OH, SOOOOO RECOMMENDED!!!

:kick:

[Sapphire Blue]

40. ... and kicked again!

:kick: :kick:

[Sapphire Blue]

52. ... and yet again!

:kick: :kick: :kick:

[w4rma]

38. Hillary Clinton's run for the nomination is going to destroy President Clinton's legacy

in many formerly naive eyes.

And, I'll help if that will keep her from winning the nomination.

Usually I consider CounterPunch to be shrill and unnecessarily critical of Democrats. But, what is quoted above is **exactly** as I have come to understand the situation.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

39. Conscience? Bill Clinton - Rwanda Hillary Clinton - IWR.

Masters of Triangulation - aka Doing whatever necessary, at whatever cost, to advance ones political career.

[papau]

58. The 3 weeks, 500,000 killed in Rwanda was too fast for governments to react - and then

no one expected more killing after the initial 500,000 were dead.


The GOP sold

"Masters of Triangulation - aka Doing whatever necessary, at whatever cost, to advance ones political career. "

and it looks like some on DU drank the kool aid.

[cooolandrew]

41. Judge people by the friends they keep, I think that says it all

[Arugula Latte]

44. Sadly, I agree with this. n/t

[OneBlueSky]

45. Clinton was a feel-good president and the ultimate showman whose policies . . .

have done immeasurable harm to this nation . . . and Hillary is of the same cut . . . both are backed by the corporate wing of the party, which are the very same powers behind BushCo . . .

the real battle in this country is between massive corporations (and those who control them) and the people . . . corporations are largely responsible for virtually every critical problems facing this nation -- the war, environmental devastation, arms proliferation, job outsourcing, wealth inequality, the healthcare crisis, loss of civil rights and liberties, all of it . . . if we elect yet another corporatist as president, the only changes we'll see will be cosmetic . . . the substantive changes needed to actually solve problems won't happen because they require going after the corporations that caused those problems, and this is something neither the Bushes nor the Clinton's are willing to do . . . you don't bite the hand that feeds you . . .

we desperately need a populist president who WILL go after corporate excesses and illegalities . . . and a Congress composed of like-minded individuals who will support him/her . . . until that happens, nothing much is going to change, and the downward spiral we've been on for the past decade of more will continue unchecked . . .

[malaise]

62. Bingo n/t

[earth mom]

48. David Geffen slamed the Clintons for their lying ways yesterday...

Why is no one talking about this on DU? Or is that I can't find the threads yet?

"Everybody in politics lies, but they do it with such ease it's troubling," Geffen said, among other comments.

<snip>

"It's not a very big thing to say, 'I made a mistake' on the war and typical of Hillary Clinton that she can't," Geffen told Dowd. "She's so advised by so many smart advisers who are covering every base. I think that America was better served when the candidates were chosen in smoke-filled rooms."

http://www.forbes.com/digitalentertainment/2007/02/22/cx_tj_0222varietybiz.html

[Captain Hilts]

50. David Geffen and Maureen Dowd. Well, if they said it, it must be true! nt

[JCMach1]

66. Let's talk about Obama's hands in that... or at least of his people

I am still undecided, but that really, really made me change the channel on Obama.

He isn't ready for prime time and that was a very slimey move on the part of his campaign operatives.

[JackRiddler]

49. Yes. Related Thread.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x261753

Gee, how come yours gets all the recommendations, even though we're both citing the same article? (It was my clever framing of it as a poll, perhaps.)

Thanks!

[Radical Activist]

67. Clinton's deregulation of the media gave us the "news" industry we have today.

We should remember what happens when we have corporate moderates who give-in too much. Clinton promoted and signed the bill that allowed the media to be owned by a half dozen conservative corporations. I want the next Democratic President to make positive change.

[bobbolink]

68. Destruction of welfare "was his idea" !!!

You are so right on that, and we have to keep repeating this for all those who have him on some pedestal.

As a matter of fact, I heard him say in an interview that he only wishes he had done it earlier in his misadministration!

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

Much is made of * having blood on his hands, but Clinton is given a free pass. He, also, is responsible for thousands who suffered from this one action, plus uncounted deaths.

And I do me UNCOUNTED. There was NO followup done. While we KNOW how many have died in Iraq, we DON"T KNOW how many died because of his destruction of welfare.

And, further and sadly, very few really care. :cry:

Thank you for this!!

[Hidden Stillness]

70. Clintons and "D"LC: Selfish and Corporate

The Clintons and their "D"LC, (or the "D"LC and their Clintons, whichever it was), have done huge damage to our Party and country, which we are only now putting an end to. At one time it seemed we could never solve it, and as much as I hate that anti-American rag "Counterpunch," the opinion against the Clintons and "D"LC is correct here, as everybody must know by now.

The campaign of 1992 featured two great Democrats, both of whom would have been great Presidents, and both of whom my family was supporting, Sen. Tom Harkin and the late Sen. Paul Simon. Instead, we got Clinton, who, I remember, was known as a phony even then. I had a chance to go to a Clinton event, and passed it up. When Clinton won, a landslide, I started to get hopeful, that there were smart, "real," popular Democrats in the White House, and that our country was recovering from the Reagan-Bush I crime wave. Then they took office and the "statements" started to come out... "A new kind of Democrat," "business-friendly," "Let's not be so associated with unions," "The solutions of the past don't work" (ALWAYS meant as a swipe at FDR and the New Deal), and of course the bizarre new slanders against "liberals": "too liberal for America" (whatever that is), "neo-left McGovernite" (an actual "slur"), telling us that "we should reach across the aisle/be bi-partisan," etc., endlessly, and now calling "extreme" the anti-business, pro-society opinions that used to be common. The "D"LC opinion was always exactly the same as the corporate Republican opinion. They didn't hate Republicans, they hated Roosevelt.

Then, the "actions" started coming--the disastrous NAFTA and GATT, destroying, to this day, the manufacturing base of the Midwest and the South, (and losing the Congress, 1994, as real Democrats in the country rebelled), the "health care plan" that was nothing but the Clintons' cozy relationship with HMO lobbyists, the "great plan" to kick poor woman off of welfare and leave them with nothing, or force them to sub-minimum wage jobs and no transportation to get there. Clinton ignored the Rwandan genocide in Africa, and the killing of Sen. Joe Biden's Violence Against Women Act here, killed by Republicans in Congress led by that prick Robert Dole--preferring to cheat on the wife and get dicksucks. There was continuing deregulation of business and commerce, more mergers, the death of the regulated media, and I remember clearly how puzzled I was when Clinton "explained" how "important" it was to "us" that "we" bail Mexico out of its debt, when the poor here could not even get help. All of Clinton's "poverty" programs involved deals with corporate interests ("Empowerment Zones," etc., although how businesses were supposed to keep going in depressed areas where people did not have money to buy their products or services, was never really explained). Like all Republicans, the money never went to the poor, where it would have helped. Notice, for example, how easily Clinton's surplus was wiped out, yet--no matter how they hate it--Republicans and "D"LC cannot kill Social Security, Medicare, etc.; this is a clue.

The "D"LC killed the entire structure of the National Democratic Party, and it took Howard Dean, recently, to build it all back up. The "D"LC did not even fund or campaign for candidates across the country, but left them stranded, as it turned everything over to the Bill Clinton Personality Party. From the March 23, 2001 "American Prospect," (and still online, I believe), Robert Dreyfuss's article, "How the DLC Does It," back when they were somewhat more succesful than they are now; the quote referring to their Simon Rosenberg, and the New Democrat (sic) Network: "To ensure that liberals don't slip through the cracks, NDN requires that each politician who seeks entree to its largesse and contacts to fill out a questionnaire that asks his or her views on trade, economics, education, welfare reform, and other issues. The questions are detailed, forcing candidates to state clearly whether or not they support views associated with the New Democrat Coalition, and it concludes by asking, 'Will you join the NDC when you come to Congress?' Next, Rosenberg interviews each candidate, and then NDC determines which candidates are viable before providing financial support." http://www.prospect.org/print/V12/7/dreyfuss-r.html For a lobbying group with almost no members, and a secret list of contributors, how shocked was everyone when they found out that the list of funders is made up of corporate Republican lobbyists.

The Clintons are still of the same type: "I feel your pain," until you remind them of their obligations to the American people, the well-coordinated slander campaigns, Republican-like, where you get hit five times before you even know what hit you once, the constant lying and slandering against Roosevelt, "left/liberals," "the old ways that don't work" (like laws, unions and the Constitution), and the disturbing use of phrases like "branding" and "brand loyalty" when describing what is supposed to be a political Party and the access of the people to their legislators.

[Sapphire Blue]

73. Kicked & OH, HOW I WISH I COULD RECOMMEND HIDDEN STILLNESS POST #70!!!!!

:kick: Hidden Stillness, anyone who can't see the truth in what you posted is blind.

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[leftstreet]

74. Outstanding Post!

:toast:

[The Flaming Red Head]

71. I would give anything

to still have Clinton in office. Anything... Anything

[leftofthedial]

72. the DLC has no commitment to principles

other than power itself

certainly not to Democratic principles